NetApp Employee Reviews about "middle management"

Pros

Great work life balance (although many, many, many people take advantage of it) Work from home is okay, by manager. Paychecks don't bounce - yet.

Cons

POLITICAL, POLITICAL, POLITICAL - Marketing morale is awful, Alliance Management is bleeding people. Middle management (from Group/1st line and up to VP) is clueless about the dissatisfaction and therefore can't fix it. No room for individual growth. Mentoring program is a joke. TOXIC work environment. Only reason it's a GPTW incumbent is because there's an entire HR department dedicated to it - and yearly bonuses are tied to it. Incent people with $ and they'll rate ya, why not?

Pros

Still some great engineers and technical experts to work with. Some innovative products being built. A lot of learning in the trenches.

Cons

Micromanagement at most levels from middle to senior management based on which team you are in. Lack of recognition esp for the people who really pull more than their weight on teams.

Pros

Employee perks, time-off policies and values of the company are well known to all - always in top 10 of Best companies to work for list. Really good work-life balance. Work from home facility can be used reasonably

Cons

Slow paced environment plus middle management is not motivated enough to drive the actual working employees

Pros

Great campus in RTP, great work out facilities, etc.

Cons

Terrible middle management. If you staff the entire management and Middle Management with ex Verizon and ex Nortel employees - see where both these companies have gone. Too much of boys club and this includes Verizon boys club and Nortel Boys club. I can only see this company go down the drain, due this poor leadership, excessive spending on unnecessary things such as beer bash - never understood what it promotes. I know its not networking within the company becos of the boys club already being so strong. I am seeing a ton of such comments written from every level and every BU of this company. I DON'T THINK HR AND GEORGE KURIAN cares to read. Anyways, my two cents worth.....

Pros

HR does a great job with benefits and employee perks. I firmly believe the reason NetApp is always in the top 10 of Fortune's Best Place to Work is due to the external factors that make employees happy - good benefits, pay is alright (I'm sure great for engineers and such), awesome cafeteria (not free food like Google but still good quality food), WFH program (if you could get your boss to approve it - our boss clamps down on it due to being in an order/sales support organization), the usual employee friendly things like Employee Appreciation Week (there's a whole shindig where you can take your kids on Family Day - petting zoo, crafts, face painting, the works). Very nice gym (again external employee perk - make sure your workload actually permits you to have time to go to the gym, lol) Very nice campus and grounds (love the fountains, the infinity pool, walk ways, mini putting green, redwoods and maples - very zen) Executives seem to have a clear vision of where to take the company. Love that they make themselves available for new employees via TOAST (Training on All Special Things) - I was very motivated and pumped after TOAST. People are genuinely nice and the teamwork mentality abounds. Volunteer time off (VTO) - another employee perk. How cool is this? You get paid to volunteer at a charity of your choice or your group's choice. I love VTO and this concept of giving time (rather than just money) to good causes.

Cons

Rotating to other functions is not encouraged at all. Some folks in our group have been at their jobs for over 5 years! While being a Subject Matter Expert is good, it also tends to breed complacency and resistance to change (notice that about my group). Our middle management (people manager and director levels) prefer 'youth' and seem to dismiss experience (i.e. people like me who are over 40 and have a lot of experience but cannot create a macro, lol. I guess Excel macros are more important than real world experience). I think this is where I take issue with the whole 'Great Place to work' deal. Externally, it does look like NetApp is a great place to work (see above pros). But when it comes to professional advancement, gaining new skills, and mentoring, I don't see much at all. 'Moving around' seems to be discouraged or people just don't want to move around! At least not in the sales support side. And it is hard to transfer from one org to another (e.g., Sales support to Operations/Supply Chain). Quality of middle management is average to inferior. Very political. Lot of favoritism. Groups do not have best practices. Work-life balance does not exist.

Pros

Offers great benefits and salaries are above average for the industry. The best technical group you will find to solve problems.

Cons

Depends on the business unit, but SMAI is poorly run due to current GM and Directors. Most of the other units seem to be well run with positive feedback from employees. Middle management makes lame attempts to make decisions for the technical direction of products and process.

Pros

Beer bash, work environment, occasional free lunch. Data ONTAP has potential, I suppose, but it's way behind the competition and is playing catchup.

Cons

The Waltham office is a satellite to the HQ in Sunnyvale and has always been treated as such - insignificant. Lots of incompetent middle management promoted from within. 4 VPs in less than 2 years?! Monthly attrition at a great place to work?!